Category Tidbits from the Archives
Following Up: Bethel’s First War Casualty
In my one of my first posts for this blog, I briefly shared the story of August L. Sundvall (A ’09), the Marine lieutenant who was killed on the Western Front on April 20, 1918 — making him the first former student from Bethel to die in our century of warfare. In honor of today’s incredibly well-timed football game between Bethel […]
Letters To (and From) Bethel: Chaplains as “Spiritual Pillars”
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from the letters sent back to Bethel during World War II by former students and members of its denomination who were serving in the military, it’s this: complaining about one’s pastor is as common in war as in peace. I did attend both Protestant chapel services, and my first impression was […]
Letters To (and From) Bethel: “Praise God for beauty in nature!”
Even a cursory glance at the letters, diaries, and memoirs of the American combat soldiers [in World War II] reveals that their view of the Old World focused first and foremost on the natural surroundings…. the GIs had a love-hate relationship with nature. That’s the somewhat surprising start to the body of Peter Schrijvers’ illuminating […]
‘Accounting’ for Shoddiness: Professionalization at Bethel
While crunching through the Clarion, I came across an interesting article from February 17, 1965: “School Employs CPA to Upgrade Accounting.” The article was occasioned by the hiring of one Ken White, CPA for Bethel’s accounting and financial affairs division. Except, calling it the “accounting and financial affairs division” is probably somewhat too generous. While the […]
Letters To (and From) Bethel: The Crash of Ruin
Several months after World War II ended in Europe, a U.S. Army chaplain named Carl Bergstrom returned to that continent aboard a hospital ship bound for the southern Italian city of Naples. Invited to the bridge by the ship’s captain, Maj. Bergstrom looked through borrowed binoculars to take in “the mighty Vesuvius spewing out its smoke toward the […]
Letters To (and From) Bethel: A Baptist Conscientious Objector
From late 1943 through the end of World War II, junior college dean Emery Johnson and other Bethel staff regularly wrote letters of greeting and encouragement to former Bethel students and the sons and daughters of Swedish Baptist General Conference churches serving in the military. Dozens wrote back, most to request copies of the denominational magazine, […]
The Cartoons of the Clarion, 1964-1975
In the spirit of the Saturday morning cartoon, today I’d like to look at the cartoons of the Clarion student newspaper. Earlier this week, I undertook a marathon research session to canvass the Clarion. Using a time line identical to that which I’m employed to study the BGC, I reviewed all Clarions from the calendar years 1964-1975, and sporadically beyond […]
Two Walfreds
One of the more popular posts at this blog was Fletcher’s commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the assassinations of Austrian crown prince Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie: the sparks that lit the fuse that set off World War I. He called it “Two Shots.” In hopes of similar popularity, but mostly out of a […]
Tweeting a Visit to the Archives
As our #bethelatwar work continues, I'm up in the archives of @BethelU and @convergeww. http://t.co/fBvIpykQQo — Chris Gehrz (@cgehrz) August 5, 2014 As the summer continues, I’ve become increasingly interested in integrating social media into our digital history project, as a way of breaking down some of the barriers traditionally separating scholar and audience. Not just to share […]
World War I at 100
One hundred years ago today Britain declared war on Germany, starting the First World War. If this is your first time at Bethel at War, you might mark the occasion by reading a bit of what I’ve written about the impact of WWI on what was then Bethel Academy and Seminary, such as my recent post on the temperance movement […]
Bethel at War 1914 - 2014 